gs60 vs gs70 heat and noise

[joseph0510]

I will be buying a laptop for college and after researching ive come to a conclusion of buying one from the msi gs series.

However, i am not sure whether to buy a gs60 or a gs70. I personally like the 60 because its 15 inch and more portable, but ive heard that it has serious heat and noise issues

Will the gs70 be better off than the 60 in terms of heat and noise? I am willing to use the 17 inch gs70 over the 15 inch gs60 if it fixes those issues.

 

[volcanoscout]

I haven't seen a gaming laptop yet that doesn't have heat and noise issues, at least while actively gaming, and I've owned a few and played with many. The important question is whether you get decent cooling performance with all the heat and noise...

Both laptops have dual fan cooling which works pretty well, considering the temp load they're dealing with. You're not going to see a huge cooling advantage with the GS70, although it does have some pretty nice additional features like 6GB VRAM vs 3GB in the 60, as well as the base RAID SSD set up. If you're going to be toting it around school though, I think I'd stick with the smaller one.

 

[dasulman]

they're both literal furnaces on your lap. 50+ degrees C ( thats 120+ F ) at load on the keyboard, and hitting a scary 78C or 172.4 on the bottom of the base.
whilst on battery power both limit their CPU and GPU power and still go up in extreme heat.
If you're focused on the GS series and worried about heat then get the GS70
at load, the GS70 is cooler by comparison on the bottom and top however still running hot at 63.3C and 52C at the bottom and top. so only your legs benefit.
if you want a cooler and thin laptop at a 15.6'' size then check this: http/www.notebookcheck.net/Gigabyte-P35W-v2-Notebook-Review.121197.0.html

 

[joseph0510]

Will they be hot even when im just surfing the web? I would probably place the mouse and the laptop on top a desk when playing games.

 

[volcanoscout]

That's a good write-up and the P35W does run cooler than the GS60, but you take a performance hit. Not a huge one, but measurable. Really it comes down to personal preference and priorities - which balance of size, performance, heat/noise and battery life best suits your needs.

The review also reinforces my point about gaming laptops - everything is a trade-off. A few weeks ago, I replaced mine and the final two I was looking at were the P35 an the NP7338, mainly because I wanted something smaller and cooler than my past gamers. For me, the lower performance was an acceptable price.

 

[dasulman]

That's a good write-up and the P35W does run cooler than the GS60, but you take a performance hit. Not a huge one, but measurable. Really it comes down to personal preference and priorities - which balance of size, performance, heat/noise and battery life best suits your needs.

The review also reinforces my point about gaming laptops - everything is a trade-off. A few weeks ago, I replaced mine and the final two I was looking at were the P35 an the NP7338, mainly because I wanted something smaller and cooler than my past gamers. For me, the lower performance was an acceptable price.

the p35W has an 870M, where's the performance hit?

 

[volcanoscout]

Look at the benches in the article you linked.

 

[dasulman]

Look at the benches in the article you linked.

2 fps in two different games worse off for the gigabyte compared to the GS60, but the gigabyte does slightly well against the GS70 when it comes to games? Maybe i'm blind or missing something?

 

[volcanoscout]

Look at the benches in the article you linked.

2 fps in two different games worse off for the gigabyte compared to the GS60, but the gigabyte does slightly well against the GS70 when it comes to games? Maybe i'm blind or missing something?

If you read my post carefully, you'll find that I didn't mention the GS70 at all. The head-to-head comparison in the article you linked was by no means comprehensive, but here are all of the ones that included both the P35W and the GS60:

Cinebench R11.5 CPU Multi 64Bit – GS60 +3%
Cinebench R11.5 CPU Single 64Bit – P35W +3%
Cinebench R15 CPU Multi 64Bit – GS60 +11%
Cinebench R15 CPU Single 64Bit – GS60 +3%
3DMark (2013) - 1920x1080 Fire Strike Standard Score – GS60 +2%
Metro: Last Light 1366x768 High (DX11) AF:16x – GS60 +9%
Metro: Last Light 1920x1080 Very High (DX11) AF:16x – GS60 +6%
BioShock Infinite 1366x768 High Preset – GS60 +2%
BioShock Infinite 1920x1080 Ultra Preset, DX11 (DDOF) – GS60 +4%

I think these numbers support my statement about taking a performance hit pretty conclusively - specifically, I described it as "Not a huge one, but measurable".

The point that I was trying to make wasn't that one was better than the other; it was that the value of any particular specification is relative to the user. What you may consider a negligible detail, someone else may place a great deal of weight on. I couldn't care less if it gets 33 FPS vs 35 FPS in any particular game or benchmark, but I know plenty of people who think it's very important. I'll give you another example: Most of the P35W reviews that I've read rave about the battery life, which is very good, especially for a gaming laptop. However, the fact that its battery is non-removeable was a deal-killer for me, regardless of how long that battery lasts. It's all relative.